Voting rights groups and Democrats filed two, separate lawsuits in Ohio Friday that the parties said were aimed at making voting easier in the battleground state this November amid the coronavirus pandemic. The legal action aims to expand online and email ballot applications and
Republicans, including Secretary of State Frank LaRose, criticized the efforts. A GOP spokesman accusing the groups of “indifference to election security.”
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Pharma giants GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi Pasteur have announced they will supply 100 million doses of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine to the United States as governments buy up supplies in hopes of securing a candidate that works.
The United States will pay up to $2.1 billion “for development including clinical trials, manufacturing, scale-up and delivery” of the vaccine, the two companies based in Europe said in a statement. Sanofi will get the bulk of the funds.
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Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam announced Friday that the government will postpone highly anticipated legislative elections by one year, citing a worsening coronavirus outbreak in the semi-autonomous Chinese city.
The Hong Kong government is invoking an emergency ordinance in delaying the elections. Lam said the government has the support of the Chinese government in making the decision to hold the elections on Sept. 5, 2021.
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A federal appeals court Friday threw out Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s death sentence in the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, saying the judge who oversaw the case did not adequately screen jurors for potential biases.
A three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered a new penalty-phase trial on whether the 27-year-old Tsarnaev should be executed for the attack that killed three people and wounded more than 260 others.
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In a historic, unanimous and bipartisan vote Thursday, the Ohio House ousted its Republican speaker as the chamber’s top leader following his indictment in an alleged $60 million bribery scheme.
Rep. Larry Householder is the first Ohio House speaker ever removed by the chamber, according to the Ohio History Connection. His nametag was unscrewed from the speaker’s dais shortly after the vote, but he still retains his seat in the GOP-led Legislature.
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Herman Cain, former Republican presidential candidate and former CEO of a major pizza chain who went on to become an ardent supporter of President Donald Trump, has died of complications from the coronavirus. He was 74.
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Boeing lost $2.4 billion in the second quarter and the company will slow production and cut more jobs as demand for commercial aircraft shrinks during the coronavirus pandemic.
The loss was far worse than Wall Street expected; so was the decline in revenue, which fell 25%.
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Federal agents who have clashed with protesters in Portland, Oregon, will begin a “phased withdrawal” from the city, Gov. Kate Brown said Wednesday.
Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf said in a statement the plan negotiated with Brown over the last 24 hours includes a “robust presence” of Oregon State Police in the downtown of the state’s largest city.
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Attorney General William Barr defended the aggressive federal law enforcement response to civil unrest in America, saying on Tuesday “violent rioters and anarchists have hijacked legitimate protests” sparked by George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police.
Barr told members of the House Judiciary Committee at a much-anticipated election year hearing the violence taking place in Portland, Oregon, and other cities is disconnected from Floyd’s killing, which he called a “horrible” event that prompted a necessary national reckoning on the relationship between the Black community and law enforcement.
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They command corporations with gold-plated brands, millions or even billions of customers, and a combined value greater than the entire German economy. One of them is the world’s richest individual; another is the fourth-ranked billionaire. Their industry has transformed society, linked people around the globe, mined and commercialized users’ personal data, and infuriated critics on both the left and right over speech.
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Joe Biden was uncharacteristically tight-lipped on Tuesday about the final stretch of his search for a vice president. But the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee seemed prepared to talk about at least one leading contender: California Sen. Kamala Harris.
As he took questions from reporters on Tuesday, Biden held notes that were captured by an Associated Press photographer. Harris’ name was scrawled across the top, followed by five talking points.
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Global air travel is recovering more slowly than expected and it will take until 2024 to return to pre-pandemic levels, the trade association for the airline industry said Tuesday.
The International Air Transport Association pushed back its prediction by one year due to the slow containment of the outbreak in the U.S. and in developing countries.
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by Darlene Superville WASHINGTON, D.C. (AP) — Melania Trump has announced plans to redo the White House Rose Garden to make it more in line with the original design implemented during the 1960s Kennedy administration. The first lady says Monday in a statement that decades of use and changes made to support a modern presidency have taken a toll on the outdoor space just off the Oval Office. President Donald Trump has been using the Rose Garden a lot more lately to make statements and hold news conferences in the age of the coronavirus. The first lady also hosted a state dinner for Australia in the garden last year. Plans described by the first lady include returning the Rose Garden to its original 1962 footprint with improved infrastructure and drainage and a better environment for the plants and flowers. The renovation also includes making the space more accessible for people with disabilities, and improvements for audiovisual and broadcasting needs, she said. “The very act of planting a garden involves hard work and hope in the possibility of a bright future,” said Mrs. Trump, who adds the garden project to a list of other White House renovations, including refurbishing the Red…
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OAKLAND, California (AP) — A protest in Oakland, California, in support of racial justice and police reform turned violent when a small group of rioters wearing helmets and goggles and carrying large signs that doubled as shields set fire to a courthouse, vandalized a police station and shot fireworks at officers, authorities said. About 700 demonstrators participated in what started as a peaceful march Saturday night but then some broke from the larger group and smashed windows, spray-painted graffiti and pointed lasers at officers, said Officer Johnna Watson, an Oakland Police Department spokesperson. Several fires were set in the downtown area, including one at the Alameda County Superior Courthouse that was quickly contained. Demonstrators hurled rocks, ceramic paint-filled balls and frozen water bottles through windows at the courthouse, federal building and police building in a raucous night that was unlike peaceful marches that have taken place in the city in recent weeks, Watson said. “This was different,” Watson said. “This group of protesters had specific intentions to participate in one way or another — whether that’s carrying backpacks in with clearly very heavy items, and the smaller group would actually be engaged in doing the damage — there is…
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Plans for the 2020 college football season — if it is played — should start coming into focus this week.
They will trickle down from the top of major college football, with Power Five conferences putting in place revised schedules they hope will make it easier to manage potential disruptions brought on by COVID-19.
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Deep-pocketed and often anonymous donors are pouring over $100 million into an intensifying dispute about whether it should be easier to vote by mail, a fight that could determine President Donald Trump’s fate in the November election.
In the battleground of Wisconsin, cash-strapped cities have received $6.3 million from an organization with ties to left-wing philanthropy to help expand vote by mail. Meanwhile, a well-funded conservative group best known for its focus on judicial appointments is spending heavily to fight cases related to mail-in balloting procedures in court.
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With eight successful Mars landings, NASA is upping the ante with its newest rover.
The spacecraft Perseverance — set for liftoff this week — is NASA’s biggest and brainiest Martian rover yet.
It sports the latest landing tech, plus the most cameras and microphones ever assembled to capture the sights and sounds of Mars. Its super-sanitized sample return tubes — for rocks that could hold evidence of past Martian life — are the cleanest items ever bound for space. A helicopter is even tagging along for an otherworldly test flight.
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Minnesota health officials warned Friday of a possible resurgence of lung injuries related to vaping, saying they’ve had 11 reported cases in the past two months.
The state Health Department asked medical providers to watch for additional cases. Officials also said the coronavirus has made it more difficult to identify vaping-related cases because the symptoms can be similar. All 11 cases — with a median age of 18 — required hospitalization and some needed ventilators.
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Ohio House lawmakers on Friday moved to address the power vacuum created by the arrest of current Republican Speaker Larry Householder amid a $60 million federal bribery probe.
The names of potential candidates to take the reins of the House of Representatives are spilling out — two days after federal officials arrested Householder and four associates over alleged bribes to shepherd an energy bill into law.
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Regis Philbin, the genial host who shared his life with television viewers over morning coffee for decades and helped himself and some fans strike it rich with the game show “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” has died at 88.
Philbin died of natural causes Friday night, just over a month before his 89th birthday, according to a statement from his family provided by manager Lewis Kay.
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Tennessee’s attorney general says mask mandates are constitutionally defensible in an opinion that comes as some county mayors have moved to enact the requirements.
Attorney General Herbert H. Slatery III wrote in an opinion Friday that for more than a century, the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized that “a community has the right to protect itself against an epidemic of disease which threatens the safety of its members.”
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The former Minneapolis police officer charged with murder in the death of George Floyd was charged Wednesday with multiple felony counts of tax evasion, according to criminal complaints that allege he and his wife didn’t report income from various jobs, including more than $95,000 for his off-duty security work.
Derek Chauvin and his wife, Kellie May Chauvin, were each charged in Washington County with six counts of aiding and abetting filing false or fraudulent tax returns in the state of Minnesota and three counts of aiding and abetting failing to file state tax returns.
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A sharply divided U.S. Supreme Court denied a rural Nevada church’s request late Friday to strike down as unconstitutional a 50-person cap on worship services as part of the state’s ongoing response to the coronavirus.
In a 5-4 decision, the high court refused to grant the request from the Christian church east of Reno to be subjected to the same COVID-19 restrictions in Nevada that allow casinos, restaurants and other businesses to operate at 50% of capacity with proper social distancing.
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Virginia has removed from its iconic state capitol the busts and a statue honoring Confederate generals and officials. That includes a bronze statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee positioned in the same spot where he stood to assume command of the state’s armed forces in the Civil War nearly 160 years ago.
They are the latest Confederate symbols to be removed or retired in the weeks since the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police sparked a nationwide protest movement.
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China ordered the United States on Friday to close its consulate in the western city of Chengdu, ratcheting up a diplomatic conflict at a time when relations have sunk to their lowest level in decades.
The move was a response to the Trump administration’s order this week for Beijing to close its consulate in Houston after Washington accused Chinese agents of trying to steal medical and other research in Texas.
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Tension was thick in the air. After 10 consecutive votes in which another man had garnered more support than Larry Householder’s favored candidate to be the next Ohio House speaker, Householder leaned back quietly in his chair, arms confidently propped behind his head.
As usual, he was playing the long game.
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The White House reluctantly dropped its bid to cut Social Security payroll taxes Thursday as Republicans prepared to unveil a $1 trillion COVID-19 rescue package, yielding to opposition to the idea among top Senate allies.
“It won’t be in the base bill,” said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, speaking on CNBC about the payroll tax cut, killing the idea for now. The cut in the tax that finances Social Security and Medicare has been a major demand of President Donald Trump.
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Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine reversed course on Thursday and called for a nuclear bailout energy law to be repealed in the wake of the state’s $60 million bribery scandal.
The Republican DeWine said he continues to support the policy in the bill, including preserving Ohio’s two nuclear power plants as part of power generation in the state.
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President Donald Trump announced Thursday that he has scrubbed his planned Republican National Convention scheduled for Florida next month, citing a “flare-up” of the coronavirus.
Trump’s formal renomination will still go forward in North Carolina, where a small subset of GOP delegates will still gather in Charlotte, North Carolina, for just four hours on Aug. 24. Florida was to have hosted four nights of programming and parties that Trump had hoped would be a “four-night infomercial” for his reelection.
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The United States ordered China to close its consulate in Houston, escalating tensions between the world’s largest economies as President Donald Trump ramps up pressure against China ahead of the November election. Beijing denounced the order Wednesday as “outrageous” and said it would draw a firm response if not reversed.
The physical closure of the consulate, one of six in the United States along with China’s mission to the United Nations, marked a dramatic step in increasingly contentious relations that have been strained not only by the coronavirus pandemic but by disputes over trade, human rights, Hong Kong and Chinese assertiveness in the South China Sea.
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A powerful earthquake off Alaska’s southern coast jolted coastal communities late Tuesday, and some residents briefly scrambled for higher ground over fears of a tsunami.
There were no immediate reports of damage in the sparsely populated area of the state, and the tsunami warning was canceled after the magnitude 7.8 quake off the Alaska Peninsula produced a wave of a less than a foot.
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President Donald Trump announced Wednesday that he will send federal agents into Chicago and Albuquerque to help combat rising crime, expanding the administration’s intervention in local enforcement as he runs for reelection under a “law-and-order” mantle.
Using the same alarmist language that he has employed in the past to describe illegal immigration, Trump painted Democrat-led cities as out of control and lashed out at the “radical left,” even though criminal justice experts say the increase in violence in some cities defies easy explanation.
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A nuclear plant bailout law should be repealed immediately, Democratic members of the Ohio House announced Wednesday as a bribery scandal involving one of the state’s most powerful lawmakers unfolded over the law’s passage.
The announcement came a day after Larry Householder, the Republican speaker of the Ohio House, and four associates were arrested in a $60 million federal bribery case connected to the taxpayer-funded bailout.
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Fourteen people were injured, one person was in custody and additional suspects were being sought after gunfire erupted outside a funeral home on Chicago’s South Side where at least one squad car was present, police officials said Tuesday.
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A coalition of states, environmentalists and American Indians on Monday renewed its push to stop the Trump administration from selling coal from public lands after a previous effort to halt the lease sales was dismissed by a federal judge.
Joined by the Northern Cheyenne Tribe and several environmental groups, Democratic attorneys general from California, New York, New Mexico and Washington state filed a lawsuit challenging the administration’s coal program in U.S. District Court in Montana.
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A new high school graduate may take out about $37,200 in student loans for college, according to a recent NerdWallet study.
And for many of them, that won’t be enough.
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President Donald Trump signed a memorandum Tuesday that seeks to bar people in the U.S. illegally from being counted in congressional reapportionment, a move that drew immediate criticism and promises of court challenges.
Trump said that “respect for the law and protection of the integrity of the democratic process warrant the exclusion of illegal aliens from the apportionment base, to the extent feasible and to the maximum extent of the President’s discretion under the law.”
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A Nevada company that started in 1973 with a single hotel-casino in Reno announced Monday it has completed a $17.3 billion buyout of Caesars Entertainment Corp. and will take the iconic company’s name going forward as the largest casino owner in the world.
Eldorado Resorts Inc. said the combined company will now own and operate more than 55 casino properties in 16 U.S. states, including eight resorts on the Las Vegas Strip.
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The Minnesota Legislature passed a broad slate of police accountability measures early Tuesday that includes a ban on neck restraints like the one that was used on George Floyd before his death in Minneapolis.
The package also bans chokeholds and so-called warrior-style training, which critics say promotes excessive force. It imposes a duty to intercede on officers who see a colleague using excessive force. It changes rules on the use of force to stress the sanctity of life. It makes changes in arbitration rules affecting police unions. Officers will get more training on dealing with people with mental health issues and autism. The measure also creates a new advisory council for the state board that licenses officers.
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Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and four others were arrested Tuesday in a $60 million federal bribery probe, a person briefed on the investigation confirmed.
U.S. Attorney David DeVillers’ office would not discuss details of the case, which it planned to outline at a briefing later Tuesday.
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A self-described “anti-feminist” lawyer found dead in the Catskills of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound is considered the prime suspect in the shooting of a federal judge’s family in New Jersey, the FBI said Monday.
Roy Den Hollander, who received media attention including appearances on Fox News and Comedy Central for lawsuits challenging perceived infringements of “men’s rights,” was found dead Monday in Sullivan County, New York, two officials with knowledge of the investigation told The Associated Press.
The FBI said Den Hollander was the “primary subject in the attack” and confirmed he had been pronounced dead but provided no other details.
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School districts that plan to reopen classrooms in the fall are wrestling with whether to require teachers and students to wear face masks — an issue that has divided urban and rural schools and yielded widely varying guidance.
The divide has also taken on political dimensions in Iowa, among other places, where Democratic-leaning cities like Des Moines and Iowa City have required masks to curb the spread of the coronavirus, while smaller, more conservative communities have left the decision to parents.
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Several prominent Muslim American elected officials endorsed Joe Biden for president in a letter organized by Emgage Action ahead of an online summit that starts Monday and features the presumptive Democratic nominee.
Among those signing the letter, obtained by The Associated Press, are Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and Indiana Rep. Andre Carson, all Democrats.
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Big technology companies powered stocks higher on Wall Street Monday, adding to the market’s gains after a three-week winning streak.
The S&P 500 rose 0.84% after being down 0.3% in the early going. Gains by technology and communication stocks and companies that rely on consumer spending outweighed losses elsewhere in the market. The rally, which gained strength in the final hour of trading, nudged the benchmark S&P 500 index to a slight gain for the year and drove the Nasdaq composite to an all-time high.
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Former Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a Republican and frequent Trump critic, has been approached and is expected to speak at the Democratic National Convention on Biden’s behalf next month, according to a person with direct knowledge of the plans who insisted on anonymity to discuss strategy. Kasich is among a handful of high-profile Republicans likely to become more active in supporting Biden in the fall.
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Investigators are examining a possible connection between the shooting and the body of a man found dead from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound in Sullivan County, New York, a law enforcement official said.
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Twitter says the hack that compromised the accounts of some of its most high-profile users targeted 130 people. The hackers were able to reset the passwords of 45 of those accounts.
The San Francisco-based company said in a blog post Saturday that for up to eight of these accounts the attackers also downloaded the account’s information through the “Your Twitter Data” tool. None of the eight were verified accounts, Twitter said, adding that it is contacting the owners of the affected accounts.
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Guest lineups for the Sunday news shows:
ABC’s “This Week” — Govs. Asa Hutchinson, R-Ark., and Jared Polis, D-Colo.; Rep. Donna Shalala, D-Fla.; Grenita Lathan, interim superintendent of the Houston Independent School District.
NBC’s “Meet the Press” — Polis; Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C.; Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health; Gov. Mike DeWine, R-Ohio; Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.
CBS’ “Face the Nation” — Gov. Larry Hogan, R-Md.; Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms of Atlanta; Dr. Michael Drake, incoming president of the University of California.
CNN’s “State of the Union” — Clyburn; Mayors Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles and Ted Wheeler of Portland, Oregon; Gov. Tate Reeves, R-Miss.; Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass.
“Fox News Sunday” — President Donald Trump.
by Calvin Woodward and Desiree Seals ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) — Representative John Lewis, who became a household name at the height of the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s and then went on to become a celebrated Congressman, died. He was 80. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi confirmed Lewis’ passing late Friday night, calling him “one of the greatest heroes of American history.” “All of us were humbled to call Congressman Lewis a colleague, and are heartbroken by his passing,” Pelosi said. “May his memory be an inspiration that moves us all to, in the face of injustice, make ‘good trouble, necessary trouble.’” Lewis’s announcement in late December 2019 that he had been diagnosed with advanced pancreatic cancer — “I have never faced a fight quite like the one I have now,” he said — inspired tributes from both sides of the aisle, and an unstated accord that the likely passing of this Atlanta Democrat would represent the end of an era. Lewis was the youngest and last survivor of the Big Six civil rights activists, a group led by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. that had the greatest impact on the movement. He was best known for leading…
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After weeks of wrangling, the Pentagon is banning displays of the Confederate flag on military installations, in a carefully worded policy that doesn’t mention the word ban or that specific flag. The policy, laid out in a memo released Friday, was described by officials as a creative way to bar the flag’s display without openly contradicting or angering President Donald Trump, who has defended people’s rights to display it.
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